Let’s say that you are playing the role of a person who is confident yet light-hearted and decisive yet open-minded. How would you portray your character’s characteristics with your body? How would you show these qualities with your face? How would you bring these characteristics to life when you speak? Before you step out onto that stage, you may want to rehearse in front of a mirror, and you might even get someone you trust to be your frank, adjudicating observer, ready to share how they felt as you rehearsed your performance. In fact, your ability to portray the character in all its various expressions might expand when you are fully in costume.
Let’s say that you are playing the role of a person who is confident yet light-hearted and decisive yet open-minded. How would you portray your character’s characteristics with your body? How would you show these qualities with your face? How would you bring these characteristics to life when you speak? Before you step out onto that stage, you may want to rehearse in front of a mirror and you might even get someone you trust to be your frank, adjudicating observer ready to share how they felt as you rehearsed your performance. In fact, your ability to portray the character in all its various expressions might expand when you are fully in costume.
You might think taking on a role that places you on stage has nothing in common with stepping into the spotlight as an executive leader. What you are about to read are several ways in which you might be able to capitalize on the world of theatre to show up as your best version of yourself as an executive leader.
Before you step into your executive leadership role, spend time carving out the pieces you are going to be the most mindful of in those first few hours and days. Here are several suggestions.
- Write down five to ten situations you expect to encounter in your position as a leader. Work through them in like manner as you would be creating an instruction manual for yourself. For example, if an employee brings me a situation concerning a conflict they are having with a co-worker, I will. Finish the sentence. When you create a plan in writing in advance, you have a formula to follow and following it will support you in delivering consistency as well as evolving through your experience. Your consistency builds trust with the people who are responsible to you, and your evolution demonstrates that you are open to growth in your role.
- How do you see yourself? Take the time to evaluate how you show up matches the expectations of the role you have representing the company. Your appearance matters. Do you smile? Do you walk with purpose? Do you prepare? Do you arrive early? Do you have expectations as to how those in senior positions of authority show up?
You may think that these things are all rather basic and have no need to be discussed. You may have taken doing these things for granted. You may be performing these things naturally without coaching or instruction. The suggestions offered above are there simply to serve as reminders that every position we hold as an employee for a company not only comes with status but also comes with expectations from those in your charge as well as those in more senior positions of authority. While you may have license to exhibit some of your own interpretation of those expectations, you are there to carry out a role in a way that serves the bigger picture.
When air travel was first launched as a passenger airline, the personnel chosen to serve customers on board the flight were female and they were called stewardesses. They were outfitted in a way that helped the passengers identify them as representatives of the company and as persons in authority. They had uniforms. The pilots had uniforms. And so it was easy for the public to see that the flight attendants and the pilots were members of a team and the team was in charge. Those uniforms said a lot. They may have even elevated the status of flying. The uniforms of the flight crew are still very much a part of the identity of airlines today and airlines have seen fit to expand the line of uniform pieces to allow the members of their staff to express their own interpretation of what it means to wear the uniform.
As an executive leader, you are on stage. Define your uniform. Behave the part. Carry it out with mindfulness. Demonstrate your empathy, your authority, your integrity and your ability to be the best executive leader you can be as you serve your company and the people in your charge.
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Donna Dahl is an internationally renowned executive empowerment coach. She is a thought leader, a speaker and an author of self-empowerment books. Her writing also appears in numerous articles online. Among her many awards since 2011, she was named a Global Women Leader in 2023.